


'til the oceans fell away

by asael



Series: lake song [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route Spoilers, Hallucinations, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Past Relationship(s), Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:02:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23083678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asael/pseuds/asael
Summary: Years after he should have been dead, Dimitri awakens in Almyra in the care of its king, Claude. In his mind, reality and nightmares blur, and the path to recovery seems impossible to find.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Claude von Riegan
Series: lake song [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1659037
Comments: 28
Kudos: 289





	'til the oceans fell away

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to write a followup to [full and sweet as honeydew](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22161769) since I finished it, so it was time. There will probably be at least one more part - more likely two, if I'm being honest, but I can't promise anything for sure. 
> 
> This fic is much more about mental health and recovery than anything else. I've tried to treat it with dignity and care, especially considering the canon setting's near complete lack of knowledge about mental illness, but I apologize if I've failed in any way. And thank you for reading!

From the moment he awoke Dimitri knew that something was different. He couldn’t put a finger on it at first, couldn’t figure out what it was, but then all of a sudden he knew.

It was the air itself.

Wherever he was, the air felt warmer, thicker. There was no bite to it, the way there so often was in - in Faerghus? He thought that was where he had been. He wasn’t sure.

_You are a ghost. How can you feel anything?_ Glenn hissed in his ear.

That was probably true. But still, he felt the warmth of the air pressing against him, somehow tethering him to the earth. It was _different_ , and Dimitri didn’t know what that meant. Whatever curse tied him to the world instead of letting his soul slip away, this was the first time things had felt so different.

“You’re awake,” someone said, and Dimitri let himself look around. Let himself look at this place, wherever it was, real or not.

He was in a room. The walls were stone, he thought, but a pale yellow kind that he was not familiar with. High in the walls were windows, and through them sunlight shone in. Across them were bars, and it was that which told Dimitri he was in a cell. He felt strength pulse through him, but it was there and gone again in a moment. He could not control it. He hadn’t been able to for a long time.

“Sorry,” the voice said, and there was a hint of laughter in it. “I promise you’re not really a prisoner. It’s more that I didn’t know how you would react - I don’t really want you running off.”

Dimitri let his eye track a beam of sunlight. In the shadows behind it he saw Lambert briefly. Wherever he was, his ghosts had followed him. That was no surprise. They always did. He followed the sunlight further, to the place where it spilled across the skin of the man by the door.

He looked familiar. He sounded familiar, and then Dimitri remembered something he’d thought wasn’t real.

_Claude_ , he thought, but he didn’t say it. When he was able, he tried not to respond to his ghosts. When he was the most aware, which he thought he was now, part of him knew they weren’t real. At those times, he tried to ignore them, tried not to interact. He had some vain hope, deep down, that perhaps if he did so successfully they would disappear. Of course this did not work, but still he tried.

Claude kept talking regardless. They often did. “I’m gonna keep you locked in here at least until you’re a little healthier, though, so - well, I guess you are a prisoner. Sorry about that.” He did sound sorry, and Dimitri wondered what that meant. What any of this meant. “And sorry about - well. All of that. I figured we’d better take care of it while you were asleep.”

Claude waved a hand at Dimitri, and Dimitri took stock of himself.

He thought that it had been some time since he’d done so. It had ceased to matter, he had long since stopped caring about the state of his body. But now - now things had changed.

He did not know how long he’d been asleep, but he thought it must have been some time. He’d been bathed, and his clothing was fresh as well. It was loose around him, the style different than he was used to, the fabric fine. 

His head felt lighter, and he realized that his hair had been cut. Probably for the best, it had been hopelessly tangled. He’d cut it himself when he could, with knife or sword, and when he remembered, but he was aware now that he hadn’t remembered for some time.

It felt - strange. All of it. In truth, Dimitri could not remember how long it had been since he’d been truly clean. He had vague memories of dunking himself in streams or rivers, of washing blood - animal or human, he did not know - off himself. But so much of his memories were shrouded in confusion, in a heavy mist of ghosts and madness with only brief, bright islands of lucidity.

Like the one he found himself on now. It would not last. They never did.

_Because you are ours, _whispered his stepmother’s voice, and she was correct. He was not a person, to deserve these sorts of things - baths and well-made clothing and a roof over his head, even if it was the roof of a cell. He did not deserve them, but he had them, and he didn’t have the strength to protest.__

__He didn’t _want_ to protest._ _

__“The drugs should be out of your system by now, so you’ll be able to eat. I’ve got some soup here, and water.” Claude walked closer, his footsteps soft. He set a bowl down near Dimitri, a waterskin next to it. He was too close, close enough that Dimitri could reach out, could snap his neck or tear his flesh from his bones._ _

__But there was no point to that. If Claude was not real, attacking him would do no good. If he _was_ real - which was impossible - then Dimitri had absolutely no desire to hurt him. He had never truly wished to hurt Claude._ _

__“I wish you’d talk to me,” Claude said, and he stepped back. In the sunlight, Dimitri could see the curve of his smile. “But I know it’ll take time, if it happens at all. I just want you to know that you’re safe here, Dimitri. No one will hurt you, and I’ll be back.” He paused for a moment as if he wanted to say something more. Dimitri could not read the expression on his face._ _

__Sadness?_ _

__“See you later,” Claude said finally, and then he left._ _

__The door that swung shut behind him was made of steel. Dimitri felt certain that it was secured on the outside, and that was good. It was unlikely to keep him confined if he truly wanted to get out, but -_ _

__The truth was, he didn’t._ _

__What was out there for him? The war was over. He didn’t always know that, but in this moment he did. The war was over, and he was dead. He was lost, had been lost for a long time, and somehow he had ended up here. He vaguely remembered Dedue, remembered falling asleep and waking up here._ _

__But Dedue might have been a dream or a ghost, just as Claude might have been. Whatever, whoever had brought him here, the facts of the matter were this: there was a roof over his head. He was clean, he had been given food. He had nowhere else, nothing else._ _

__What did it matter if they locked him in?_ _

__He felt his thoughts fraying at the edges. Whispers slipped through his ears. He ignored them as best he could, surveyed the room. A bed, which he was laying on - a true bed, small but comfortable, with a soft pillow and a light, pale yellow coverlet. In the warmth of this place, he would need nothing more. There was a small table, too, simply made but sturdy and with a bowl of soup sitting upon it. Next to the table was a matching chair._ _

__Dimitri found that standing was difficult. This was not a surprise. When his crest activated, he had all the strength in the world - but he had long since lost any ability to control it. Maybe he’d never been able to in the first place. Without his crest, he was often as weak as a kitten, barely clinging to survival. The table was close, though, and he was able to make his way there._ _

__He could not taste the soup, of course, but it was warm and thin, more of a broth than anything. That quickly revealed itself as a wise decision - the moment the warm liquid slid down his throat, Dimitri realized he was starving. Had been starving, perhaps, for years. He devoured the soup, and the thinness of it was likely the only thing that kept his stomach from rebelling against the speed at which he ate._ _

__He remembered, vaguely, that being a problem at times in the past. Food could be difficult to find, and when he did find it, he gorged himself - only to violently expel it not long after._ _

__Whoever had brought him here (Claude?) seemed to know that much._ _

__He drank some water, and then a tide of weariness washed over him. It was all Dimitri could do to reach the bed, and he sank onto it with some relief._ _

__Lambert berated him for allowing himself to be captured, ordered him to fight his way out and find vengeance, but Dimitri was too tired to heed him. _Anyway,_ he thought to himself, _there is no one to deliver vengeance upon. Not anymore.__ _

__He didn’t know how he knew that, how he knew the war was long over. He didn’t know if he would remember that when he awoke. These islands of lucidity never lasted, and he knew that soon he would become a beast again._ _

__Best that he be confined, since that was the case._ _

__Darkness crept over him as his head lowered itself to the pillow, and Dimitri sank under the waves._ _

____

***

Time was slippery for Dimitri. It had been for a long time, though of course he wasn’t sure - couldn’t be sure - how long. He thought he had been there for weeks, though - knew at least it had been more than a few days. He could not track time, but he felt stronger. More alive.

He had been eating regularly, he knew that much. That broth-like soup at first, and then as he grew used to regular meals, more substantial fare. Dimitri did not know the last time he’d gotten regular meals. During the war, perhaps, however long ago that was.

There were no mirrors in his cell, of course, which was for the best. He did not think he could stand to look at himself, wasn’t sure he’d recognize the man who looked back. But even without a mirror he could tell that his body had filled out to some extent, his ribs no longer visible when he changed.

And he did change. Along with food, he was regularly brought fresh clothing, as well as water to wash with. He wasn’t being treated like an unwanted prisoner, for all that he was locked in a cell. He wasn’t sure that was the right thing to do.

He’d lashed out occasionally, he knew. In this moment, he was lucid, aware of his surroundings and firmly rooted in the present, but that wasn’t always the case. It _usually_ wasn’t the case, and when he was lost he didn’t understand where he was, couldn’t tell friend from foe. Though he was not strong enough to be a real threat if his crest wasn’t active, he knew that he’d growled and glared and, once, thrown his bowl of broth at the man who had come to bring him more water.

It hadn’t been Claude. He knew that much. He’d lashed out at that man - a servant? A guard? - because he had been unable to figure out whether he was real or one of the ghosts that haunted him, one of the hungrier spirits. But Claude, he knew, was not a ghost. Even in the depths of his madness he knew that now.

He hadn’t been sure at first, but though Dimitri was mad, he was not stupid. Claude visited him regularly, and each time Dimitri could catalog all the things that had changed. All the differences, the things that made it clear that this Claude was not dead, was not a ghost, was not the boy he’d known at the Academy or the man he’d face on Gronder Field.

This Claude was older, wiser. More patient, more tired. His hair was longer, pulled back in a braid. Sometimes, when the light fell on it just right, Dimitri could see the glimmer of silver strands threaded through it. But though Claude had clearly aged since they were in school, since that terrible meeting during the war, he still looked well, he still looked young. His green eyes still shone and his lips still curled into a smile so easily. Sometimes it was even a real one.

He wore fine clothing, similar to what Dimitri had been given but with more layers, finer fabrics, intricate patterns. Sometimes when he visited he wore jewelry, gold bracelets that glittered around his wrists and chains that draped his neck, jeweled clips fastening his braids. Sometimes he only wore one earring, the same one that Dimitri used to trace his finger along when they were alone together.

He was different enough that Dimitri knew, after some observation, that he had to be real. Dimitri’s ghosts never aged, never changed from the familiar faces he had once known, tattered and wounded, angry and sad. They whispered in his ears and stared at him from the shadows - they did not smile and talk of the weather outside, or ask how he liked the food, if he needed anything.

_He’s keeping you prisoner,_ Glenn said, _snap his neck and tear the door from its hinges. You’re a beast, you can’t stay here._

But, even as he grew stronger, Dimitri managed that much control. He would not, could not, give Claude’s ghost a reason to haunt him.

Today, Claude had come not long after one of his meals. He did this sometimes, he came and talked to Dimitri - talked _at_ Dimitri, since Dimitri did not participate. He’d snarled at some of the servants, yelled and pounded the walls, but words - at first, they had seemed beyond him. 

But Claude’s easy conversation felt different. He spoke to Dimitri like he was a person, like he might simply choose to join the conversation, to give Claude his opinion on the furnishings, to request a book to read or news of the outside world.

Dimitri wasn’t a person. Not most of the time. But there was some part of him still that yearned for it, that remembered those bright days when he’d walked along the monastery paths, when he’d had friends, when he had been part of something. There had been cracks even then, but he’d held himself together. He’d done the best he could to be the prince they needed, and with Claude - 

With Claude, even back then, he’d always been just another person. Not a prince, not a beast.

Perhaps there was no way back for him. Perhaps he had shattered too completely. But Claude did not seem to think so.

And so, that day, when Claude paused for a moment in his light conversation to take a sip of water, Dimitri spoke.

“Where am I?” he asked.

His voice was hoarse, shaky. He had not used it properly for so long that it took effort to form the words, effort to put them in the right order. For a moment, as if shocked, his ghosts fell silent.

Claude, on the other hand, brightened. His smile grew, so close to real but tinged with a sadness that Dimitri knew was for him, even if it hurt to see it. There was some part of him, even now, that desired nothing more than to see Claude happy.

Though he smiled, though his eyes shone, Claude didn’t make a big production of it. He didn’t shout or clap, he didn’t congratulate Dimitri for finally speaking. He only smiled and responded as if they’d been having a conversation the whole time, as if this wasn’t the first thing Dimitri had said to him since he’d awoken. 

“Almyra,” Claude said.

Dimitri took a moment to digest the answer. He had thought perhaps the Alliance somewhere - Derdriu, maybe. But the warmth of the air, the sun that shone through his windows, the unfamiliar garments - it made sense, once Claude had said it. Or at least, it made sense that this was Almyra, that he was no longer in Fódlan at all. The rest of it, the _why_ , didn’t make any sense at all. He frowned at Claude, struggling for words, and though he was sure Claude knew what he would ask, still he waited patiently for Dimitri to speak.

“Why have you brought me here?” he managed, finally.

“I don’t know if you remember,” Claude said, his words careful but his eyes, as always, sharp, “but you were staying with Dedue, for awhile. He thought that you would be safer here - that you would have a chance to recover in a way that may not be possible in Fódlan. Or in Duscur, for that matter.”

Dimitri’s brow furrowed. He did remember Dedue, he thought. He remembered Dedue, and a small, warm house. He even remembered Claude, he thought - just a moment, a glimpse of him. He didn’t remember how he’d gotten there, or how he’d gotten here.

He wondered if that ought to bother him, but found that it did not. So many stretches of his history were blank, so many memories shrouded in fog or nothing more than impressions, sensations. 

He was not sure he had been anything approaching human. He didn’t know when he’d last had a conversation with someone. He wasn’t sure this really counted as one, since he couldn’t find any more words. He simply looked at Claude, and Claude told him carefully, softly, how he had been found in the mountains bordering Duscur. How everyone had thought him dead, how they had thought that for years, how he and Dedue had realized he was in no state for a miraculous return from the dead.

And so, Claude had brought him here. To Almyra.

Dimitri did not understand all of it, could not put all the pieces together. But he listened and he tucked them away, to think over later, to try to puzzle it all into place.

What he thought more than anything, looking at Claude, was: _Almyra. Of course._ His brown skin, his skill with a wyvern, the way he had never quite fit in, the way people had always seemed to find a foolish reason to distrust him. He had never told Dimitri, not even when they were laying in each other’s arms, but Dimitri could not be offended. He had kept secrets from Claude, as well, after all.

Claude finished the story, and smiled at him, and said he’d be back soon. Dimitri’s eyes didn’t leave him until the door swung shut behind him.

Almyra. And Claude. He did not deserve any of this.

***

Nighttime always seemed to be the worst. His ghosts were there during the day, but the sunlight, the interruptions from servants bringing food and water and fresh clothing, visits from Claude - even when he was deep in his madness, these tiny reminders of the real world could sometimes help keep him steady.

Well. Not steady. But steadier.

When night fell, that seemed to slip away. If he was able to sleep, which he often wasn’t, there would be nightmares. If he could not sleep, there were his ghosts, and nothing to hold on to that could remind him there was another world.

Nighttime was when Dimitri knew that he had never left the mountains, that the small room in Almyra and Claude’s friendly face were a lie. That was when he knew that Dedue was dead because of him, that all his friends were rotting, that Claude had died at his hand, torn apart on Gronder Field simply for the crime of momentarily standing in his way.

That was when he knew he was dead, too. Nothing more than a revenant, a hungry ghost haunting a world that belonged to better men than him. A ghost with ghosts of his own, whispering in his ears, reminding him of what he was.

_Who would ever want to help you? Who would ever want to_ save _you? You’ve never been worth that._

They were right. They always had been. He had not even been able to avenge their deaths - instead, he had only caused more pain, had only hurt people he should have protected.

It didn’t matter whether he slept or not. His nightmares were no worse than reality: a madman only capable of pain, disappointment, destruction. It was in the dark of night that this truth settled on him, when he could not ignore it, and though the sunrise helped - it could not change the truth of things.

***

Claude kept visiting him. Dimitri didn’t know how long he had been there, but he found himself able to count the days in a way that had been impossible for a long time. Days, weeks, months, even years had blurred together - he could not say how long it had been since the war, since the monastery, since the Tragedy. He’d lost track long ago, everything blurring together as a result of how far he’d fallen. As a result of his weakness.

But there in Almyra, Dimitri began to realize that his days held a regularity that was unheard of. Servants brought his morning meal at the same time each day, along with water to wash with and fresh clothing and bedding. Lunch came in the middle of the day, and then dinner in the evening, each as regular as the monastery’s bells had been so long ago.

Claude’s visits were the only thing that varied, and even those had their own kind of routine: though he did not come every day, and when he did the length of the visit varied, he always arrived at the same time, not long after Dimitri’s lunch.

With regular meals to mark his days, Dimitri could keep track of them. Not always - still sometimes he lost himself, days slipped together, he lost track. But when things were better, he could count his meals, keep track of the days, feel time move by him.

It was - strangely satisfying. For the first time in who knew how long, sometimes Dimitri almost felt human.

And there was Claude, with his patience and his easy smiles. He had offered Dimitri books, games, things to pass the time with, but Dimitri did not feel ready for that sort of thing - didn’t think he would be able to focus on the printed words of a book, knew he would become frustrated with a game. So Claude came to break up his days, and as time passed, Dimitri found himself becoming curious. Becoming more able to talk, to ask questions.

“Why Almyra?” he asked, two days after the day he’d finally spoken to Claude. 

And Claude tipped his head to the side, and smiled, and said, “Because I’m the king.”

That was the only thing Dimitri asked that day, the only thing he said at all. Claude’s answer was so unexpected, so much _more_ than he expected, that he needed to turn it over in his mind.

Claude, the King of Almyra. Claude being from Almyra was not so terribly surprising, but to think that all that time he’d been hiding such a vital fact - that his father was the king of another land, that the throne would be his someday. 

Dimitri did not hold that secret against him. It was easy enough for him to imagine what effect that knowledge would have had upon the people of Fódlan. They’d already distrusted Claude - the truth would have put him even more at risk. He had hidden that part of himself for so long, from his friends, from his lovers.

After Claude left, Dimitri remembered those long-ago school days. Claude, always smiling, seemingly carefree. Dimitri, trying so hard to play the role of the perfect prince, sometimes barely holding himself together. He’d been attracted to Claude’s easy ways, his cleverness, his soft lips and the way he would melt in Dimitri’s arms. But even back then he had seen something like loneliness in Claude’s eyes sometimes, something distant and untouchable.

Claude had never spoken of it, and Dimitri had never asked. Now he was years and many deaths from that boy he’d once been, the one who had believed his innocence was gone and only darkness remained. He had not known then how much further he had to fall. But even then, he had known that Claude was hiding things - and surely, he thinks now, Claude had known the same about him.

He could not imagine now that he had ever been able to make Claude happy. 

But he visited again, always with a smile, always seeming as if he was happy to see Dimitri. Sometimes Dimitri was in no state to talk, but more and more often he found himself able to, found Claude’s presence to be - grounding. Comforting.

When he did, when he could, he asked questions. Never about Fódlan, never about the war, he knew he wasn’t ready for that. Instead he asked about Almyra, about Claude, about how he had won the throne.

And Claude told him. He told Dimitri how he had returned to Almyra - easily skirting around the subject of the war - how he had fought for and won the support of the people. How he had ascended to the throne, and how despite what Claude referred to as ‘some opposition’, he had held it ever since.

Dimitri didn’t know much of Almyra, but he knew enough to think that Claude had likely done something incredible. But that was his way, wasn’t it? To do incredible things and make them look easy.

But they weren’t easy. Dimitri had seen it long ago, in those moments when they were alone and Claude’s loneliness, his weariness, slipped past his mask. He did not see it now, and knew it was because now he was one of Claude’s burdens. Something to carry, not someone to lean on.

_Not worth any of this_ , his stepmother hissed in his ear, and he knew it was true.

One day, after Claude had told Dimitri how he’d reached out to other nations, how Almyra was opening itself up, he paused.

“I’ve searched,” he said, “and there’s someone I’d like you to talk to.”

Dimitri’s brow furrowed. He had spoken to no one but Claude since he had woken here - he could not count the shouting and growling at the servants that he did when he slipped down to the depths of his madness as _talking_. He couldn’t imagine that anyone else would _want_ to talk to him, not when he still wasn’t even sure why Claude would.

“In Dagda, they have many different sects that worship many different gods. Some small, some large, and each of them with different practices. I found a sect that worships a god of - well, of the mind, I guess. Their followers think of themselves as healers, and they offer care to those who have lost themselves.”

_Like you_ , Claude doesn’t say, but Dimitri knows they’re both thinking it.

“I sent someone there to speak to them, to ask if they could come here. They’ve sent someone - she arrived a few days ago. One of their most skilled priestesses.” Claude paused, his eyes on Dimitri, something uncertain in the depths of them. “I’ve told her a little about you - not everything, I promise. Just enough to see if she thought she could help.”

Dimitri was silent, listening. There could be no help for him, he knew. Even this - something so simple as a conversation - was nearly beyond him.

“She said that they’ve seen people like you before, that they’ve developed techniques and treatments that might be able to help. It’s not a cure, she says there isn’t really any such thing, but that there are ways to make it - better. Easier.” Claude took a breath, gaze still steady on Dimitri. “Will you see her?”

Dimitri could not meet his eyes. He hadn’t even spoken of what he saw to Claude - had never really spoken of it to anyone. But Claude had heard him ranting to his ghosts, and so had Dedue, and so they knew some of it without being told. But the idea of speaking of it to anyone, to admitting how far from human he had become - 

He could not do it.

“No,” he said.

“All right,” Claude said. “But she’s staying for awhile, in case you change your mind. We don’t get a whole lot of visitors from Dagda, so you can be sure I’m gonna make the most of it.”

He didn’t sound upset. Even so, Dimitri knew that he was disappointed, knew that Claude had wanted him to say yes. Perhaps it was that, or perhaps it was something else entirely, that made him speak again, made him force the words out.

“Not yet,” he said, and he looked up, just for a moment, into Claude’s green eyes.

And Claude smiled, and said, “Okay,” and Dimitri thought he saw something like hope there.

***

His dreams didn’t change. The nights were always the hardest - no one, nothing there to remind him of where he was, who he was. His ghosts, reminding him of the truth.

He was a beast, a monster. He had done nothing but hurt people. Disappoint them. He had been meant for something more, but he had not been strong enough - not strong enough to fight, not strong enough to win. He knew that, he had always known that, but they whispered in his ears, they reminded him of the truth.

The nights didn’t get easier. They shouldn’t have. He deserved their weight.

But - 

But he heard Glenn’s voice in his ears and for one moment, just one, he thought of Claude. Claude’s green eyes, watching him so steadily. Claude’s eyes, full of hope.

He thought of how he could track time, track the passage of the days. How his body had filled out, how he’d grown stronger, strong enough to move without his crest’s power. He thought of how Claude kept coming back, again and again.

Glenn was right. His father was right. Patricia was right. He deserved none of this.

But he had it, and wasn’t it even more of a sin to waste that hope?

He closed his eyes, and he curled in on himself, and he thought: _this isn’t real._

He did not believe it. Not really. But he wanted to, and somehow, in some way, that helped.

***

And then came a day when Claude asked him a question.

“Want to go on a walk with me?”

Dimitri, not certain what to expect, said yes, because he wanted to see Claude smile. And Claude smiled.

They walked. Dimitri walked past the doorway of the room he’d stayed in for so long, walked along the hallways at Claude’s side. They didn’t go far. A few doors down, Claude pushed another open and led Dimitri through, and then they were in a garden.

Like so many things, Dimitri couldn’t remember the last time he’d been outside. Or rather - he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been outside and been aware of it. And he was aware of it now, aware of himself, aware of Claude, aware of the sun above. 

He knew he’d lived outside for a long time. He had memories of it, flashes of the mountains, of trees, of animals he’d hunted and killed because he needed to survive. Because he was barely more than an animal. He’d been outside then, but it hadn’t mattered, it hadn’t meant anything to him.

This meant something. He looked around, and he felt as if the world was new.

The garden they walked in was just on the edge of wild, but with an odd deliberation to it, as if that was what the gardener intended. The flowers were brightly-colored and unfamiliar - Almyran flowers, the sort that Fódlan only ever saw on the very edges of Alliance lands. He wondered suddely what Dedue would think of these flowers. He could remember his old friend in the greenhouse at Garreg Mach, large hands tending to seedlings so carefully.

Garreg Mach was the last place he’d felt human. The last place he’d felt glimmers of happiness, despite everything that weighed him down. He’d had friends there, and classmates, and - Claude.

Dimitri’s eyes went to Claude then, walking quietly next to him. When they’d been together, young and foolish and so full of hope, he had been beautiful. He was beautiful now, even more fully himself, confident and clever and untouchable.

At first Dimitri could not name what he felt in that moment, looking at Claude in the sunlight as he reached out to touch a flower. Then he knew, with a sudden strange reordering of the world around him.

Desire.

It had been years since he’d felt that. Years since he’d even remembered he could. In those days it had been Claude too, Claude smiling at him in the dining hall, Claude beneath him in their small dormitory beds. He felt like a teenager again then, wanting Claude with an intensity that he did not expect and could do nothing with.

Claude was still beautiful. Dimitri was barely human.

He looked away, closed his eyes against the sight of Claude in the sunlight. Swallowed down this unfamilar feeling, let it flood him with memories.

And then, without thinking, without anything except a sudden, urgent need to know, he spoke.

“How did the war end?”

He hadn’t asked before, hadn’t been able to think about it. He thought he knew the bare bones of it, the simple facts, but he wanted to hear it from Claude’s lips, to make it real.

Claude paused, turned to him. He looked at Dimitri for a long moment, and Dimitri wasn’t sure he was going to answer. Then he spoke.

“My army took Enbarr. Adrestia fell, and I faced Edelgard. She died at my hand.”

There was no joy in his voice, no triumph. In his eyes there was sadness - regret, perhaps, at being forced to kill someone he had once considered a friend.

_He’s lying,_ Lambert whispered in Dimitri’s ear. _She was a monster, responsible for all the pain you suffered. Who could regret a death like that?_

Claude could, Dimitri knew. Claude, who hid his compassion with smiles and misdirection, who let people think the worst of him.

_He’s stolen your vengeance from you,_ Glenn said, a howl of fury, his eyes glowing with it. _He’s stolen everything from you and turned you into this, a prisoner, a wretched creature._

“No,” Dimitri whispered, and Claude’s brow furrowed. Dimitri clenched his fists, trying to block them out, trying to push them away. None of it was true, he knew that. He knew that this was only his emotions veering out of control, the memories he had avoided for so long making themselves impossible to ignore.

“Dimitri?” Claude said, voice carefully gentle but so clearly concerned. He reached out, and Dimitri stepped back abruptly, afraid to be touched, afraid that Claude’s hand on his arm would shatter any remaining control he had. He would spiral downward, he would lash out, he would hurt the person who had saved him, who still did not understand that he was -

_Nothing but a monster,_ his ghosts hissed, _a waste of his time, a waste of compassion._

_You should have died at Gronder Field._

“I need to go back to my room,” Dimitri said, or thought he said. The sunlight, the bright flowers, they were slipping away, replaced by the fog of memories and the shadowy figures of those he had failed.

He didn’t hear Claude’s response, but he followed his figure, slender but solid. The last vestige of reality, all Dimitri could see that he _knew_ was real. Claude did not try to touch him again, but he led him back inside, back to that small, safe cell, and when Dimitri growled at him, told him to get out and lock the door, he did.

Dimitri could only be thankful for that, even if it left him along with his ghosts, his nightmares. He covered his ears and closed his eyes, but that had never sent them away. At least he was alone. At least he had not hurt Claude.

***

It would have been right for Claude to leave him there. It would have been right for him to keep his distance, to see Dimitri’s near loss of control for what it was. Surely he understood the danger he had been in, surely he could see now that whatever hopes he had for Dimitri’s recovery were in vain.

But that had never been the sort of person Claude von Riegan was.

He came to Dimitri’s room the next day - Dimitri thought it was the next day, in any case. He thought it had only been one night that slipped away from him in his madness, but he couldn’t be certain. What he knew was that Claude arrived at his usual time, walked through the door as if nothing was wrong, and smiled at Dimitri.

“How are you feeling?” he asked. Though he smiled, his eyes were sad, and Dimitri wanted to tell him not to waste those kinds of emotions on a beast like him.

He didn’t. Instead he said, “You aren’t safe with me.”

Claude shrugged, as if it didn’t matter. “I think you’re wrong about that.”

“I wanted to hurt you,” Dimitri said, and Claude’s eyes narrowed.

“I don’t think you did,” he said. Always observant. Too observant, and Dimitri felt as if Claude was looking right through him. “I think you were afraid that you would, so you made sure it wasn’t possible. I know you don’t think you can control yourself, but you did.”

Dimitri didn’t know what to say to that. Claude wasn’t wrong, but Dimitri could not believe that he was right, either. He didn’t understand how Claude still had hope for him, could still believe in him. Dimitri had given up on himself so long ago. When he looked at Claude - when Claude looked at him - some part of him wanted to hope, too.

It was true that he hadn’t hurt Claude.

Claude looked away then, took a breath. “It’s been eight years since I mourned you, Dimitri, eight years since the world believed you dead. I regret not being able to help you back then - even now I do. I’m not going to give up on you.” He summoned up a smile, slid it on to cover up the sadness beneath, but Dimitri could still see the shadow of it there. “Besides, you’ve only been here a few months and you’ve already come so far. Maybe you can’t see it, but I can.”

There was a part of Dimitri that would never understand this. A part that listened to his ghosts, that wholeheartedly believed he should be dead, that he deserved to be lost. After all of those he’d failed, all the damage he had caused, how could that not be true?

But Dedue had cared for him enough to find him, and Claude valued him enough to - to believe in him. 

And the truth of the matter was that Claude was right. Of course Claude was right. The simple fact of Dimitri standing here, having something like a conversation - strong enough for it, in control of himself enough for it. He had, indeed, come a long way. He couldn’t deny that, and in that moment, Dimitri could almost believe that there might be a future for him.

Claude reached out, and this time Dimitri let Claude take his hand. It was a strange feeling, Claude’s warm hand in his. He still had those familiar callouses from archery, his fingers were still slim and strong. Dimitri couldn’t remember the last time someone had touched him, though he knew it must have happened.

“I’m sorry,” he said. It wasn’t enough to encompass the guilt he felt, the apologies he needed to give. His fingers tightened on Claude’s. “I wanted to hurt you. But I wanted to protect you, too. I - can’t always control myself, but I need to.” He made a decision then, ignoring the voices that told him it was pointless, ignoring the weight in his heart that was certain he would fail.

“Your Dagdan healer. Is she still here?”

“Yes,” Claude said, and Dimitri looked up from Claude’s hands to meet his eyes, that clear piercing green gaze that had always taken him apart so easily. He thought of Claude, and Claude’s belief in him, the sun on his hair and the light in his eyes. He thought of the man he should have been, a just and righteous king, and the broken creature he was now. And somehow, when Claude was the one looking at him, the difference between those two things didn’t seem so vast.

“I’d like to see her,” Dimitri said.

Claude’s smile then was true enough to break his heart, and for the first time in a long time, Dimitri felt the same glimmer of hope that had always been in the depths of Claude’s gaze.


End file.
